Nothing Has Struck Me So Much In America As The Fact That These
State Legislatures Are Puny Powers.
The absence of any tidings
whatever of their doings across the water is a proof of this.
Who
has heard of the legislature of New York or of Massachusetts? It
is boasted here that their insignificance is a sign of the well-
being of the people; that the smallness of the power necessary for
carrying on the machine shows how beautifully the machine is
organized, and how well it works. "It is better to have little
governors than great governors," an American said to me once. "It
is our glory that we know how to live without having great men over
us to rule us." That glory, if ever it were a glory, has come to
an end. It seems to me that all these troubles have come upon the
States because they have not placed high men in high places. The
less of laws and the less of control the better, providing a people
can go right with few laws and little control. One may say that no
laws and no control would be best of all - provided that none were
needed. But this is not exactly the position of the American
people.
The two professions of law-making and of governing have become
unfashionable, low in estimation, and of no repute in the States.
The municipal powers of the cities have not fallen into the hands
of the leading men. The word politician has come to bear the
meaning of political adventurer and almost of political blackleg.
If A calls B a politician, A intends to vilify B by so calling him.
Whether or no the best citizens of a State will ever be induced to
serve in the State legislature by a nobler consideration than that
of pay, or by a higher tone of political morals than that now
existing, I cannot say. It seems to me that some great decrease in
the numbers of the State legislators should be a first step toward
such a consummation. There are not many men in each State who can
afford to give up two or three months of the year to the State
service for nothing; but it may be presumed that in each State
there are a few. Those who are induced to devote their time by the
payment of 60l. can hardly be the men most fitted for the purpose
of legislation. It certainly has seemed to me that the members of
the State legislatures and of the State governments are not held in
that respect and treated with that confidence to which, in the eyes
of an Englishman, such functionaries should be held as entitled.
CHAPTER XVI.
BOSTON.
From New York we returned to Boston by Hartford, the capital or one
of the capitals of Connecticut. This proud little State is
composed of two old provinces, of which Hartford and New Haven were
the two metropolitan towns. Indeed, there was a third colony,
called Saybrook, which was joined to Hartford. As neither of the
two could, of course, give way, when Hartford and New Haven were
made into one, the houses of legislature and the seat of government
are changed about year by year. Connecticut is a very proud little
State, and has a pleasant legend of its own stanchness in the old
colonial days. In 1662 the colonies were united, and a charter was
given to them by Charles II. But some years later, in 1686, when
the bad days of James II. had come, this charter was considered to
be too liberal, and order was given that it should be suspended.
One Sir Edmund Andross had been appointed governor of all New
England, and sent word from Boston to Connecticut that the charter
itself should be given up to him. This the men of Connecticut
refused to do. Whereupon Sir Edmund with a military following
presented himself at their Assembly, declared their governing
powers to be dissolved, and, after much palaver, caused the charter
itself to be laid upon the table before him. The discussion had
been long, having lasted through the day into the night, and the
room had been lighted with candles. On a sudden each light
disappeared, and Sir Edmund with his followers were in the dark.
As a matter of course, when the light was restored the charter was
gone; and Sir Edmund, the governor-general, was baffled, as all
governors-general and all Sir Edmunds always are in such cases.
The charter was gone, a gallant Captain Wadsworth having carried it
off and hidden it in an oak-tree. The charter was renewed when
William III. came to the throne, and now hangs triumphantly in the
State House at Hartford. The charter oak has, alas! succumbed to
the weather, but was standing a few years since. The men of
Hartford are very proud of their charter, and regard it as the
parent of their existing liberties quite as much as though no
national revolution of their own had intervened.
And, indeed, the Northern States of the Union - especially those of
New England - refer all their liberties to the old charters which
they held from the mother country. They rebelled, as they
themselves would seem to say, and set themselves up as a separate
people, not because the mother country had refused to them by law
sufficient liberty and sufficient self-control, but because the
mother country infringed the liberties and powers of self-control
which she herself had given. The mother country, so these States
declare, had acted the part of Sir Edmund Andross - had endeavored
to take away their charters. So they also put out the lights, and
took themselves to an oak-tree of their own - which is still
standing, though winds from the infernal regions are now battering
its branches. Long may it stand!
Whether the mother country did or did not infringe the charters she
had given, I will not here inquire.
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